>>Good evening, and thank you for joining us.

This is the Sixth District School Board Debate, presented by VPM News and The Richmonder.

I'm Keyris Manzanares, Richmond City Reporter with VPM News.

>>And I'm Victoria Ifatusin, education reporter with The Richmonder.

Tonight, we're bringing together the candidates running for the Sixth District seat, Anne Holton and Jackie McDonnough.

This isn't the first time these candidates are facing off to represent Martin Luther King Jr.

Preschool, Oak Grove-Bellemeade, and Overby-Sheppard Elementary Schools, and Martin Luther King Middle.

>>That's right, they both applied for the open seat in the interim, after former school board representative Shonda Harris-Muhammed resigned last year.

The Richmond School Board elected Ms.

Holton to temporarily fill that vacancy, and she's currently sitting on the board.

Over the next hour, you'll have the opportunity to hear from both candidates, their priorities, proposals, and vision for Richmond Public Schools.

Before we get started, let's cover a few ground rules for tonight's debate.

Opening and closing statements are 90 seconds each.

We'll alternate the candidate order.

There will be three Q and A rounds, with one-minute timed responses, and as moderators, we have the discretion to offer the candidates 30 seconds for a rebuttal.

Candidates, if you have a rebuttal, simply raise your hand.

>>There will also be two lightning rounds of questions, where candidates will give one-word responses, or pick an answer from the options given.

We ask that the audience remains respectful and avoid clapping, or interrupting the candidates while they speak.

>>Now that we have set the ground rules, let's meet our candidates.

For your opening statements, we ask that you introduce yourself, and tell us what the role of a school board member is, and how you plan to fulfill that role if elected.

Ms.

Holton, you have 90 seconds.

>>Thank you, I'm Anne Holton.

Thank you to our hosts and to all of you present.

Every single student in Richmond deserves a great education as a trampoline to life success, and our amazing educators can make that happen if we have their backs.

My experience attending Mosby Middle School, now MLK, in the days of school desegregation, made a huge impact on me, and I've been passionate about RPS ever since.

My husband and I have attended St.

Elizabeth's Church here in Highland Park for 42 years.

Our three children got a great education in RPS.

I have advocated for our children and families as a legal aid lawyer, as a judge, reforming foster care, leading George Mason University, and as Virginia's Secretary of Education where I helped secure $1 billion dollars new investment in education, including the first big teacher pay raises in decades.

We face many challenges in Richmond, crumbling, outdated buildings, families impacted by racial and economic inequities, teacher shortages, gun violence, and yet, we have made progress, hiring and keeping great teachers and paying them better, though not enough.

And they are fueling impressive gains in student learning.

But those gains are at risk, because our revenues do not match our needs.

For decades, the government has short-changed our schools.

We now have some crucial opportunities to fix this, and I am uniquely able to help.

I'm also laser-focused on accountability and transparency.

As your school board member, I will make students and families the center of every conversation.

>>And now, Ms.

McDonnough, you have 90 seconds.

>>I am Dr.

Jackie McDonnough.

I'm an immigrant from Trinidad and Tobago.

My parents brought us to this country because they believed in the promise of America.

During the 38 years that I have lived in the Sixth District, I taught in Richmond Public Schools and we also sent our boys to Richmond Public Schools.

I've also worked as a professor of science education at VCU.

I encouraged many of my family members and extended family to move to Richmond, because I truly believed that this city, in this city as a place where regular people could buy a home and raise their children.

But folks, my grandsons missed more than a week of school because of mold at Obama.

And frankly, I'm worried about their health.

I decided to run in this election because I was disturbed by my opponent's votes to hire an outside contractor to supply long-term substitute teachers, and to close the virtual academy.

But once I started delving deeper, I was also disturbed by the walk back I was seeing in collective bargaining agreements, low reading scores for black students in Sixth District elementary schools, and the glaring lack of transparency and accountability.

Because of my background, I feel deeply, a deep sense of responsibility for our schools.

I believe in my core that every child, no matter their race, nationality, gender, ZIP code, or physical or mental health has the right to a quality education.

>>Thank you so much, appreciate it.

Let's turn now to our first Q and A round, starting with your priorities for Richmond Public Schools.

If elected, what are your top priorities and how should voters hold you accountable?

Ms.

McDonnough, one minute.

>>One of my top priorities is engaging all parents, meeting them where they are, and welcoming them in with the resources that they need to be active participants in their children's learning.

And when they can't do that themselves, get the community involved.

I also believe in strong collective bargaining agreements that attract the best talent in the state.

And that means competitive pay and good working conditions, and also modernization of schools, which includes cleanliness and safety.

>>Thank you.

Ms.

Holton?

>>Thank you.

Obviously, our very top priority, and I think we would all agree, is student success.

That's what we're here for, to help prepare our students for their future.

To do that, we have to have a top-quality teacher in every classroom.

That's what the research tells us, is the biggest factor in student success.

To do that, we've got to improve teacher pay.

Our Richmond teachers ought to be making $10,000 more annually than our neighboring school divisions, and I didn't make up that number.

The research justifies it, because of all we ask them to do.

To do that, we've got to get more money from the state.

We've got to address our decades of short-change funding.

I also agree with my opponent, that parent engagement is crucial.

Parents need to be partners with our educators, partners with our community in support of our student success.

>>Thank you.

This year's budget process began with a draft calling for $22 million in cuts as RPS faced a significant shortfall.

With rising costs, future budgets may also require cuts.

Where would you look to reduce spending?

Ms.

Holton, you have one minute.

>>Well, we did go through a very tough budget year.

My colleagues who appointed me in February, didn't tell me that I was walking into a buzzsaw, very, very difficult budget year this year, and we did have to make some tough, tough choices.

And yet, we prioritize the things that are outlined in our strategic plan, and among them, high-quality teachers.

So we worked hard to protect the teachers in the classrooms, to protect their pay raises, and that I would do, continue to do in the future.

We are going to face more lean budget years, probably over the next 18 months.

The truth is, we've gotten a little bit out over our skis, because we knew how important it was to be paying our teachers well, and thereby, reduce our teacher shortages, which we have done, and help our students improve their academics, which we have done.

We've basically spent some short-term, one-time money on long-term needs.

And so we're going to have some hard years until we can get more resources from the state.

>>Ms.

Holton, where would you look to reduce spending?

>>Well, if we have to make further reductions, then I would absolutely look to anything other than the classroom teacher before we reduce, before we impact classroom teachers, because they are the heart of our systems.

But I also think we have savings to be found.

You know, we have hired a really strong independent auditor.

We charged him with working first on our facilities problems, and he's already finding and fixing problems there, including ones that are gonna generate savings.

I hope he can help us generate savings in transportation, for instance.

I think we overspend in that area.

And there are tools that other divisions have used across the country to help optimize transportation networks.

How do we get everybody where they need to go with the most efficient system?

So I think there are efficiencies to be had.

>>Thank you.

Ms.

McDonnough, you have one minute.

>>Well, I think first of all, we need to look at where money's being spent, and spending money effectively.

We have not had a comprehensive forensic audit in many years in RPS, and that's the first step.

We need to understand what's going on with our spending.

We have folks in our administration who have very high salaries.

Yes, we need to keep teacher pay at the level it is, and seek to increase it because we have to have the best teachers in our classroom.

But $150,000 salaries, $180,000 salaries, $200,000 salaries for people in directorate positions is not necessary.

That's one of the places we could be making cuts.

And we could also look at making cuts in how effectively we use the funds that we have now.

Audits.

>>Yes, 30 seconds.

>>Just briefly.

I think our leadership team is worth what we pay them, but even if we wiped out the entire leadership team's entire salaries, it would make a minuscule drop in the bucket towards our budget woes.

They are helping us find solutions to our budget woes.

We are embarking on systems audits, which are the much more productive kind of audits that actually find and fix problems as we go.

And we do full financial audits every year as we're required by law to do.

Thank you.

>>Thank you.

Thank you so much.

The district's collective bargaining agreement is often cited as a significant expense for the school division.

Both parties, RPS Administration and the Richmond Education Association, are currently at an impasse with negotiations.

Do you believe the current agreement is financially sustainable for the district?

If not, how would you change it?

Ms.

McDonnough.

>>I have not had a look at the collective bargaining agreement, so I cannot answer that from a place of, with data, but we do need to keep the teachers we have, and we do need to support those teachers in the roles that they have.

And I think we made those agreements initially, and we should stick with them.

Unions are the foundation of the middle class in this country, and we need to have strong unions.

Rolling back on agreements is not going to do that for us.

And I think we need to just work harder at finding the funding to do it, because our teachers, we can't have school without teachers, and we need to have the best-trained teachers, the most experienced teachers in our classrooms because of the population that we have to teach.

>>And Ms.

Holton, one minute.

>>Can you repeat the question?

>>Do you believe the current agreement is financially sustainable for the district?

If not, how would you change it?

>>So technically, we don't have an agreement right now.

We are rolling over last year's agreement plus the raises that we voted on in the budget this spring.

And yes, they are sustainable for this year.

For next year and future years, we really do need to find ways to increase our revenues.

I am a huge believer in collective bargaining agreements.

Our collective bargaining partners have made us stronger by helping us increase teacher pay rate.

One of the first things I did as a school board member was rally with our REA colleagues and our VEA colleagues at the general assembly, lobbying for more money, lobbying for legislation to help protect unions.

And I've done that for years, back to the time when I was a secretary, when I partnered with the VEA on the teacher pay raises that I mentioned earlier.

What we need to do now is address this funding disparity whereby our surrounding counties get $3,000 or more per student each year more than we do to support our students.

Over $50 million a year we're losing, because of the problems with the funding formula.

We've got to fix it.

>>Thank you.

During this year's budget process, some people spoke during public comment.

They questioned the decision to reduce the hourly rate for educators who cover classes or lose planning periods, while the district continues to pay some administrators six-figure salaries.

When the district faces a shortfall in their budget, how should the school board weigh administrative compensation against teacher compensation?

Ms.

Holton, you'll go first with one minute.

>>Well, I did mention earlier that the administrative compensation is really a drop in the bucket.

You know, I remember many years ago, we were fighting to keep a school superintendent here in Richmond.

At the same time, we were fighting to keep Shaka Smart as our basketball coach at VCU.

We were paying him something in the millions, and we were paying our superintendent in the hundred-thousand range.

We need to pay our education leaders and our educators what they're worth.

And so I don't have any problem with what we pay our leaders.

I also do think we need to respect our teachers' planning time, and that pay, the best solution to the pay for planning time is to not interfere with teacher planning time.

In American schools, we give our teachers way less planning time than the best school divisions that we compare ourself to around the world.

So we shouldn't interfere with their time, but the compensation that we're offering them is fair and comparable to other jurisdictions around the state.

>>Thank you.

Ms.

McDonnough, you have one minute.

>>Planning time, as a former teacher, I understood the importance of planning time.

And for many of us, we had to grade and plan during that time.

So protecting planning time is vitally important.

Having a board sub, some kind of sub in the school to fill some of those positions, some of the time when teachers need to, instead of taking away teacher time, but having a person in the building to do that, I think, is a strategy that we need to pay more attention to.

I strongly feel that having, taking away from the administration, I'm sorry.

But yes, protection of planning time, I think, is essential.

>>There have been ongoing questions about how RPS manages and spends its money, with many calling for an independent audit, a third-party forensic audit, excuse me.

Do you support calls for that forensic audit?

And if elected, how would you ensure that taxpayer dollars are spent appropriately?

Ms.

McDonnough, one minute.

>>Well, we now have an auditor in place, but does that auditor report directly to the school board?

That's a question that needs to be answered.

But I think what a forensic audit is, a third-party forensic audit will do, is to do a deeper dive, and the information that would be gathered, I think would inform how monies are being spent, where monies are being wasted, and what changes we need to make for better efficiencies.

I truly believe that we need to have a third-party audit from an outside agency.

>>And how would you just ensure that taxpayer dollars are spent appropriately?

>>I think with having a clear plan of how that audit is to be done.

And we could have guidance from the auditor that's in place, and we could, I mean, I think there are ways to lay out the plan of exactly what we want from that audit.

And what people are calling for, in terms of an audit, is so they would have confidence in our school system, and we need to change that narrative.

We have to return confidence in our school system and how the money is being spent.

>>Ms.

Holton, one minute.

>>We do need transparency and we do need to build trust.

Our independent auditor reports directly to the school board, and has full authority to point out to us, problems that he is not able to fix in partnership with the school leadership.

We appointed him, it was either late April or early May.

He made his first presentation to the board in public session in June, and gave us a proposed audit plan over the next three years.

In addition to his constant monitoring and responding to our fraud, waste, and abuse confidential hotline, he zeroed in on, and we directed him to first focus on facilities management, where we have issues.

And he also outlined that he would move on to transportation, one of the other areas where we are ripe for improvement.

We've got others, we need him, we've actually just hired a deputy auditor to help him.

It's much cheaper to do in-house, and much more appropriate.

A forensic audit is really, for criminal matters in court.

>>Thank you, and just to follow up, just to make sure, are you in support of a third-party audit?

>>I'm in support of the system we have now, which is an independent audit system.

>>Well, thank you both for your answers.

We are now going to pick up the pace a little bit with our first lightning round.

Again, candidates will give one-worded responses or choose an answer from the choices given.

No rebuttals will be allowed during this round.

Yes or no?

Should all Richmond public schools have a 200-day school year, rather than 180?

Ms.

Holton?

>>No, depends on the need.

>>Ms.

McDonnough?

>>No, it really is what the community needs.

>>More money for school safety, or mental health services?

>>We have to choose?

>>Yes.

>>Well, that's a desperately hard choice.

I would choose mental health.

>>Ms.

McDonnough?

>>Mental health.

>>Do you believe RPS is adequately preparing students for the workforce, or for college?

Ms.

Holton?

>>We're getting there.

Our "Dreams for RPS" plan, we've got some strong plans to make high school more career-relevant.

I'm sorry, I forgot.

>>Workforce or college?

>>Oh, you mean we have to choose workforce or college?

>>Yes.

>>That's an impossible choice, both.

>>No, they are not being adequately prepared for either.

>>Okay.

>>Thank you for your answers.

We know it's hard to stick to these very short answers.

We're going to shift gears, and turn to some of the issues at the top of mind for voters, and how you would tackle them as school board members if elected.

Mold has been an issue in Richmond Public Schools for years, and just recently, we saw how mold concerns impacted three elementary schools at the start of the school year.

Do you believe the district is adequately addressing preventative maintenance year-round?

How do you plan to prevent this from happening again if elected?

Ms.

McDonnough, you'll go first.

>>I do not believe that.

I think one of the issues is that we did not follow some maintenance plans that were in place.

The roof at Obama was supposed to be replaced.

I think they gave the timeline, It had to be replaced by 2025, that didn't happen.

Hence, we now have these issues.

Yes, we have old buildings.

Yes, our buildings are ridiculously old, and they need to be replaced, but preventative maintenance could alleviate some of those issues.

And because we don't have $400 million to build the new schools that we need right now, we have to deal with the fact that we have to have proper maintenance.

And not just proper maintenance, but the companies that are doing the work in our schools need to be held accountable for that work, especially for the maintenance of our air conditioning systems.

The same company has had that contract for years and we have constantly had issues.

>>I'll follow up with you.

How do you plan to prevent this from happening if you were elected to the school board?

>>I think a stronger remediation plan for, like a step-by-step plan of how to deal with mold in schools.

There is a plan in place, but it doesn't have very much teeth, and it doesn't, it's not working, obviously, because when we have had issues with molding, it was reported by teachers.

>>Thank you.

Ms.

Holton, you have one minute.

>>Well, first, what happened at Obama and Bellevue Elementary, and in other schools, especially this year at Obama and Bellevue was heartbreaking and unacceptable.

We have both short-term and longer-term deeper problems here.

In the short term, we have problems with facilities management, there is no question about it.

And preventative maintenance gaps on preventative maintenance was one of them.

Since I joined the board in February, we have fired our director of facilities.

We have hired our independent auditor and zeroed him in on the facilities department.

One of the gaps he has identified is preventative maintenance.

If we'd hired him six months earlier, perhaps we would have at least been able to identify these problems earlier.

But the long-term problem, we cannot put band-aids on things that need major surgery.

Obama is over 100 years old.

It was not built for a 21st-century climate or a 21st-century learning needs.

It doesn't, it has leaky roofs.

It was not built to have HVAC.

>>Just a few months ago, Bobby Hathaway, the former director of facilities, was dismissed from RPS after an investigation found that he was misusing public funds.

The Richmond School Board wasn't presented with that report until two weeks after the investigation was complete.

How can the board more effectively use its oversight powers to see what's happening in central office and within schools?

Ms.

Holton, one minute.

>>So I'm not gonna get into specifics of personnel matters, some of which are public, and some of which are not, and I'm bound by the rules of the board about not talking about things that are private personnel matters, but I will tell you that how that matter was handled was not appropriate, and we absolutely need to do better.

We need to hold the administration accountable, and we need to promote transparency.

The public needs to know.

But frankly, the problems that were going on in the facilities department were beyond what we heard in those reports, and we are very grateful that we now have new leadership, and that we're now starting to uncover and address those problems.

I will say, again, the longer-term solutions, is we've got to pass the referendum, the school construction referendum that's going to be on the ballot, along with Jackie and me this fall all across the city.

There's brochures at the back.

You can get more information from the "Yes for RPS" campaign.

We have a historic opportunity to have surgery, not band-aids for our old buildings.

Obama, Overby-Sheppard's turning 50.

It's got problems too.

>>Just in 30 seconds, how can the board more effectively use its oversight powers?

>>Well, you know, one thing, one skill I bring to the table is of a lawyer, and one of the matters we have to decide, for instance, as you well know, is what information we should release in response to a Freedom of Information Act request, for instance, for investigations.

I, as a lawyer, I can help challenge the legal advice which we get, which is sometimes on the very cautious side, let's say, and balance that against the public interest and the right to know.

>>Okay, thank you.

Ms.

McDonnough, one minute.

>>I think the issue with Bobby Hathaway and the facilities department had been an ongoing issue, and it wasn't effectively dealt with by his supervisors.

He was not an independent person operating.

He should have had more oversight.

And if the proper oversight was in place, how were you reevaluating what was going on in the facilities department over time?

The issues should have been picked up with proper evaluation.

And I think there's a problem there with accountability.

Are department, or division managers on their own, to do what they want to do?

I think there's a problem with oversight.

>>And how would you ensure that oversight is practiced?

>>The school board should have evaluative criteria in place for department heads that is being followed by the supervisor at the supervisory level.

>>Thank you.

>>Richmond is one of several localities that will ask voters to decide on an additional 1% local sales tax for school construction and major repairs.

The district is also currently engaging the community on its next master plan.

What do you see as the most pressing infrastructure need?

Ms.

Holton.

Oh, excuse me.

Ms.

McDonnough, you'll go first.

>>I think the most pressing need, the replacement of several schools, especially on the Northside, in schools that serve our communities, like Obama, Frances McClenney, Overby-Sheppard is 50 years old.

I mean, and that's what's in good shape.

We need more money to do that, but we need to do it smartly.

We have land right now around John Marshall High School, and that is a deplorable situation at the John Marshall High School.

The state, it looks like a third-world country when you go into their labs.

It is unacceptable.

We have land.

Let us use the land that we have to build our new schools, and then take the older schools out of operation.

But let's use our land, not give it away to developers for, >>Thank you.

>>Less than they were, and its worth.

>>Ms.

Holton.

>>So what's our most pressing need?

Well, the truth is we have a lot of them.

We have 1/4 of our schools are over 100 years old.

Some of them, like Obama, have pretty good bones.

Some of our schools that are 50 years old still have real problems.

The playground at Overby-Sheppard is a disaster, and we have schools that were built in the '60s and '70s that weren't built that well to start with.

So overall, our schools are 62 years, I think, on average.

We have needs all across the city.

The good news is that this sales tax, and I'm happy to talk more about that if given the opportunity, but the sales tax referendum will allow us, it will generate something like $850 million over the next 10 years, that we can leverage to address, really, all of these needs.

How we should prioritize them is what we're asking the public to help us decide as part of the facilities engagement planning, modernization plan, that work that's going forward.

We have a session here in the Sixth District at MLK Middle School on September 29th at 5:30 PM, and elsewhere in every district as well.

>>Thank you.

>>RPS has struggled with retaining some employees, from classroom educators to central office staff.

What do you believe needs to change to improve retention, and what role should the school board play in making those changes happen?

Ms.

Holton?

>>Well, attracting and retaining great teachers is the number one focus we've got to do, and it is part of our strategic plan, part of our passion for teaching, our three top passions as part of the strategic plan.

And how do we do that?

Teacher pay and working conditions.

Working conditions includes buildings, but it also includes teacher support.

Every teacher will tell you, "If I've got a supportive principal, I'll put up with a whole lot more than I would without that."

So good leadership at the division and at the school level, having our teachers' backs, paying them what they deserve, and giving them buildings that don't leak, that's the solution to teacher retention, and we have seen improvements in teacher retention.

We started the school year off this year with 99% of our positions filled.

That's a huge, last year we had, I think, 94% filled.

So we've been making steady progress on improving retention and reducing teacher vacancies.

>>Thank you.

Ms.

McDonnough.

>>In terms of retention of teachers and administrative staff.

School climate is vitally important.

And how do we get at what's going on within schools, and how teachers are being treated by administrators, the kinds of pressures that we have on principals?

We look at much better evaluation of our administrators.

360-degree evaluation, a most holistic evaluation where there's evaluation done by school board members, district leadership and administrators, principals, teachers, school staff, and community stakeholders.

We need to get to the root of the issues here.

We have been bleeding staff.

We hire well, and we lose them.

There's something wrong.

So we need to deal with that, and part of that is proper evaluations.

>>Ms.

Holton, 30 seconds.

>>One of the goals in our strategic plan "Dreams for RPS" is teacher, family, and student satisfaction, and we do annual surveys.

Our survey this spring showed a majority, an overwhelming majority of our teachers and staff are satisfied, and that metric has been improving.

It's not easy, we need to keep working at it, but we are making progress.

>>Thank you.

>>Next up is our last lightning round of the night.

Again, candidates, please give one-worded responses or choose an answer from the choices given.

No rebuttals during this round.

>>Yes or no, with information currently available, should voters support the 1% sales tax increase?

Ms.

Holton?

>>Absolutely.

>>Ms.

McDonnough?

>>Yes.

>>Yes or no?

Are you in support of the district's clear backpack policy?

Ms.

McDonnough.

>>Yes, but.

(audience laughing) >>I agree, yes for the time being.

>>Centralized district control over curriculum or more autonomy for teachers?

Ms.

Holton?

>>It's got to be a balance.

You're going to make me answer?

>>Yes.

>>It's centralized control, literacy, it's working.

>>Ms.

McDonnough?

>>There is no one-word answer to that question.

I'm serious, there isn't.

Because of the differences in our schools across the district, there are different needs, and that is there's no one-word answer.

>>Thank you, thank you.

>>Well, in one word, how would you describe the current state of the school division?

Ms.

McDonnough.

>>In need of a change of, >>One word.

(audience laughing) Just one word.

>>Improving.

>>Ms.

Holton.

>>Mixed.

>>Okay, well, thank you for your answers.

We will now move on to the final round of questions.

School divisions around the region are revisiting how much technology and screen time students should have in classrooms.

If elected, and had the opportunity to revisit Richmond Public Schools technology policies, what, if anything, would you recommend that the district do differently?

Ms.

McDonnough.

>>I would recommend almost no screen time for K through Three.

I would recommend having structures in place where children are able to talk to each other more, more face-to-face time, more, actually work with our teachers on how to ask productive questions that help students ask productive questions.

As they get older, we could use the screens for, you know, for research, and things like that.

Even at times, teaching them how to proper evaluate information they get online, 'cause there was a time when we were actually teaching kids how to discern information, and that's not happening anymore.

So yes, we know AI is here, but the research shows that screen time is actually causing children and adults to lose working memory.

>>Thank you.

>>Working memory, folks.

>>Ms.

Holton, one minute.

>>Well, I agree that we need to differentiate by age, and would agree that zero, pre-K up through grade two, in particular, we need to reduce screen time down to zero, except for special ed, where there are some students who need technology, obviously, to help address their challenges.

By third grade, we're forced by the state to give our students tests online.

They take their tests on computers.

We've got to give them an opportunity to get familiarized with the equipment.

As we move up, by the time we're in high school, we need to be teaching our students to be effective consumers of technology.

We can't hide them from AI.

We need to help them learn how to be critical users of it, and how to have the skills they're going to need for 21st-century jobs.

I'm just going to brag on one of our schools, Martin Luther King has started a no-tech Tuesday this school year.

They're experimenting with it.

If it works, maybe it's something we can spread school-wide, division-wide.

>>Thank you, Ms.

Holton.

>>The Sixth District includes communities in both Richmond's Northside and Southside.

While predominantly consisting of Black students, there is a steady growth of Hispanic students in the district, and both groups have varying needs.

What is the biggest concern you're hearing from families on both sides of the river, and what specifically would you do first as a school board member to address those concerns?

Ms.

Holton, you'll go first.

>>Yeah, well, yes, we do have growing immigrant community here in Richmond, and obviously, they're facing big challenges, not from the school system, but from what's happening in the wider world, the federal government intervention, ICE.

I've heard families talk about a mom who told the story of what happened when her husband disappeared for two months in ICE lockup, and she had to single-parent the children and he was the breadwinner, and then they released him.

So they apparently didn't have good cause to hold him in the first place.

That's happening all over.

It's happening right here in Richmond, and right here in the Sixth District.

We, in RPS, are supporting our immigrant families.

We're helping them learn, our English language learners in particular, are actually outperforming by a good margin, the schools in the region, and across the state.

So we're working hard to help them, but they need protection from the federal government.

>>Let me follow up with you.

What specifically would you do to address those concerns as school board member?

>>Well, I will continue to support our investments in English language learning.

We have, one of the things we've invested in is more teachers, LEAP teachers we call them, is the acronym these days, and they are getting results.

So I would continue to support those investments.

I would continue to support our policies of not asking anybody about citizenship status, and not communicating with the federal government, that you, our students, we tell our students and our families, you are safe here, and we do everything we can to make that true.

>>Thank you.

Ms.

McDonnough, you have one minute.

>>Well, in some of our schools in the Sixth District, we have reading grades that have fallen.

42% of our kids are reading at proficiency, 47% reading at proficiency.

And I think that's an issue that we need to deal with.

In our Hispanic community, we've made great strides and I say "yay," but we still need to figure out how to get our students reading rates, reading proficiency rates up.

Yes, I know we have this new reading curriculum that everybody's championing, but that's not enough.

We need to look at how we could help parents do more with reading with their kids at school.

And that means going into communities, and actually talking to people.

Parents want to be able to access schools, and they would love to have schools work with them.

>>Thank you, and I'll follow up with you as well.

What specifically would you do as school board member to address those concerns?

>>I would put a policy in place, help put policy in place that would put reading programs in the communities with the parents where our scores are lowest.

>>Ms.

Holton, you have 30 seconds for a rebuttal.

>>Actually, our SOL scores this year were up to 53%, which is progress.

It's still way too low, but it's progress, and we have big gaps between different groups, which is a huge problem.

One of the solutions we put into effect in addition to the literacy lessons is our 200-day schools.

We're seeing 20-point gains at Oak Grove-Bellemeade and some of our other 200-day schools that serve large immigrant communities among others.

We're really, it's helping.

>>Thank you.

>>Well, speaking of scores, with the recent release of SOL scores, RPS did see an increase in pass rates.

Most notably, were the pass rates among English learners in reading, which surpassed the statewide average, and neighboring counties like Henrico, Chesterfield, and Hanover.

But overall, only about 1/2 of all RPS students are passing all subjects.

What do you believe is preventing students from succeeding, and what should the school board do differently to address those barriers?

Ms.

McDonnough, one minute.

>>As a former classroom teacher, I know that there are students who are coming in, they came into middle school, not reading at proficiency levels.

We need to roll back to what's happening before children even enter schools.

How are we engaging parents with helping their children learn how to read, or do reading readiness?

We have Head Start programs in this community that are not being fully used.

Part of that is the advertising that RPS does, where people in the community aren't really aware of the Head Start programs that are available to them.

So we need Head Start, but we need more than Head Start.

We need resources within the communities where we are seeing these low rates.

We cannot do it all in the building.

It has to move outside of the building.

>>Thank you, Ms.

McDonnough.

Ms.

Holton, one minute.

>>In addition to what we've been doing in the 200-day schools, and the extra support we've been giving to our English language learners, one of the key solutions is we've got to implement the science of reading.

We've got to be having reading curriculum, and this is why I would support centralized curriculum and literacy that matches what the science tells us about how to teach students for reasons that are kind of hard to fathom.

But education kind of got off the rails for several decades now, and stopped teaching some basics, phonics.

Frankly, some of this is back to old-fashioned phonics and drilling exercises, helping students decode words, and then build them up.

And we have, as a city and then as a state, we have adopted the science of reading curriculum and we're now required to do by the state.

We have reading specialists that help our teachers support that, and that's why we're seeing some of these big gains, but it's just gonna take time.

>>Thank you.

>>Ms.

McDonnough.

>>In addition to reading science, >>30 seconds for everybody.

>>We need to be serious with parents about screen time for their kids.

We know that children as young as toddlers are having screens in front of them.

It is rewiring their brains.

Our kids are getting dumber, the research is showing it.

We need to have some serious conversations about even allowing children to have cell phones, or have those tablets in front of them.

And that's part of the issue.

>>Thank you.

Alright, and we're getting to our last question of the evening.

Superintendent Jason Kamras has led Richmond Public Schools since 2018.

His tenure has included both praise and criticisms.

If Mr.

Kamras' contract came before you today, would you vote to renew it, and what factors would you consider in making that decision?

Ms.

Holton, you'll go first.

>>So my assessment of the superintendent and his leadership is mixed, as I said in response to one of your earlier lightning questions, there are problems.

Communications is an example.

I've talked about "Dreams for RPS," our terrific strategic plan.

It is very hard for the public to find information about it.

It's hard for us as school board members to find information about it.

We have systems issues, absolutely, the problems in our facilities department should have been found sooner and addressed.

And yet, our students are seeing big strides.

Test scores are up, graduation rates are up, early literacy measures, family satisfaction, teacher satisfaction is up, teacher shortages are down, teacher pay is up, equity measures, for instance, advanced course offerings being more equitably offered across the city.

It's still a long way from where we need to be, but the superintendent, along with the school board and our educators, deserve significant credit, and continuity is a value in and of itself.

>>Thank you, and I have a follow-up.

So if his contract came before you today, how would you vote?

>>I would want to hear from him on some of the problem issues, and what he's going to do to address it, but if I heard adequate answers because of the proof in the pudding of the results, I would be eager to have him stay.

>>Ms.

McDonnough, you have one minute.

>>I don't think any administration can be functional without rigorous board oversight.

And that is what I think we are lacking right now.

We need to be asking some hard questions, and we need to sit in discomfort when that's necessary, because yes, there have been strides made, but we still have some significant issues.

We have had that fiasco with the facilities department.

We have had, there have been reports of intimidation.

There are issues around supervision.

So maybe we need to take a closer look at an evaluation.

And as I said before, a 360-degree evaluation.

When people take surveys, they usually always report much better.

When you go in and you do a deep evaluation, you get better answers.

>>Thank you.

So if his contract came before you today, would you vote to renew it?

>>I would have to vote based on the results of a more thorough evaluation that involved multiple stakeholders.

>>Well, we've covered a lot of ground tonight from the district's budget and student achievement, to staff retention and the responsibilities of the school board.

We'll now close with one final opportunity for each candidate to speak directly to voters.

>>In 90 seconds, please tell us why should voters choose you to serve on the school board.

Ms.

McDonnough, we'll start with you.

>>In closing, I want to remind you that I'm the only candidate who has lived, taught, and been active in the Sixth District for almost 40 years.

I was out canvassing a couple of days ago when I met a mom whose high-achieving child is in fifth grade.

She was very negative about RPS.

I felt her pain.

As I was leaving, she said she wished me luck, but she knew that I wasn't gonna be able to make any positive changes if I get elected.

Guess what, folks?

She was right.

By myself, I cannot fix RPS, but I know, together, we can.

If we rally together, and we fight for mold-free schools, equitable funding for support services, transparency, accountability, and strong unions for all our workers, we can.

But that can only happen if everyone gets involved.

That means I'm not just asking for your vote.

I'm also asking you to join us to knock doors, get a yard sign, and join this grassroots movement that must continue after election, so that together, we can have the RPS that meets the needs of all families.

>>Ms.

Holton.

>>Well, I'll end where I started.

Every single student in Richmond deserves a great education as a pathway to life success, and I want to help make that a reality.

I bring to the table my lifelong passion for Richmond Public Schools, my management experience, managing George Mason, a billion-dollar institution, contributing to the management of the state education system when I was secretary, and my education policy experience across many, many years.

And I bring my skills as a lawyer with a track record of standing up for our children and families.

We absolutely need to hold our leadership accountable, we need more transparency, and we need advocacy.

And there's where I feel like I uniquely can help.

We need to listen to our families, and I've had wonderful conversations with families all across the district, at civic association meetings, at school open houses, at the doors, and we need to invite our families to partner with us, and our community organizations, churches, civic associations, et cetera.

Together we can advocate to address the funding deficits, together, we can advocate to address the safety issues in our community.

Together, we can make our schools work for everybody.

Don't forget, "Yes for RPS" and come to the engagement sessions.

Tell us your views.

>>Thank you, Ms.

Holton, and thank you, Ms.

McDonnough, for joining us for this Sixth District School Board Debate, hosted by The Richmonder and VPM News.

>>And thank you to everybody who took the time to be here, as a reminder, early voting starts Friday, September 18th, and election day is November 4th.

Have a good night.

(audience applauding)